Lee's Lies

Lee Harvey Oswald was, throughout his life, a liar. He consistently
deceived, manipulated, and hoodwinked, with varying degrees of success.
The web of deception wove its way through not only strangers and acquaintances,
but friends and loved ones as well. In the final analysis, it becomes apparent
that Lee Harvey Oswald lied to nearly every person with whom he shared
any meaningful encounter, and that the lies are perhaps as strong a testament
as any to the path which led him to his ultimate demise.

To understand that Oswald was a liar is not to necessarily say that
he was a lone nut assassin. His frequent lies, many to government
agencies like the State Department and the FBI, might have marked him as a plausible
patsy. And his scheming and conniving might suggest that he was the sort
who could be manipulated -- hoodwinked, turned into a patsy -- by people
who were much more competent schemers and liars than Lee Oswald.

Oswald, born in 1939, had begun his term of enlistment in the Marine
Corps on October 26, 1956, at the tender young age of 17.(1) A trivial fact on the surface, perhaps, but meaningful in terms of the
chain of events set off by his military stint; many, including his half
brother John Pic and his full brother Robert Oswald, presumed that Lee
was attempting to get out from under the "yoke of oppression"
of their mother.(2) Marguerite Oswald raised
Lee alone, since his father had died suddenly, and did not provide for
their food and clothing as well as she could have, and was exceedingly
controlling.(3)It was not the first time
Oswald would significantly alter his surroundings to escape persecution,
real or imagined. In fact, it was this very same driving force which led
Oswald to Russia, where he met his future wife, Marina Prusakova.

Lee and Marina

Oswald told Marina a series of lies well before they were married. Almost
immediately, he told her he was 24 years old, the same age as another suitor
of Marina's, so she wouldn't think he was young and immature.(4)Knowing Marina's family would not want her to leave Russia for America,
Lee told Marina and her relatives that he couldn't get back into America
even if he wanted to, having permanently defected. In reality, Lee had
not fully renounced his citizenship from the United States because he failed
to fill out all the official paperwork necessary for complete expatriation,
so returning to the U.S. would hardly be problematic for either of them,
especially since they were to be married before going to America.(5)To garner her sympathy, he also claimed to Marina that his mother
was dead.(6)In fact, not only was Marguerite
Oswald still quite alive at the time, she outlived Oswald himself by several
years.

This third falsehood held special significance, because later Lee lied
again to his wife about the circumstances of his dislike for his mother.
Rather than explain his past to the woman who loved him, he merely brushed
her off by stating that the only reason behind his anger toward his mother
was that he didn't like Marguerite's treatment of Robert's wife, mentioning
nothing of the difficult childhood he endured under her harsh rule.(7)In sum, Lee was forced to tell a lie to cover up an earlier lie,
and the initial components of Oswald's web of deception had been established.

Lee's "Historic Diary"

Among Oswald's possessions originating in Russia was something he called
his "Historic Diary," an account of the time he spent in that
country. The use of the phrase "diary" is a misnomer, however,
since Oswald did not write up the accounts contained in its twelve pages
until long after the dates he wrote on each page.(8)The Warren Commission noticed a number of anachronisms in the document,
since some entries referred to events which had not yet occurred. Also,
the exceedingly melodramatic tone (and title) of the diary indicated that
Oswald was attempting to spice up the events to hold the interest of future
readers. For instance, the diary asserts that Oswald was offered citizenship
in the Soviet Union, but he refused; similarly, it states that he was asked
to address a meeting of workers in Minsk, and that he humbly declined that
proposal as well.(9)

Lee and Marina in Dallas

Upon arriving in Dallas with Marina, Oswald had a chance to begin anew,
with an utterly clean slate. His wife apparently
felt no need to hold Lee's lies against him, since she was forced to rely
upon him for everything. Marina could not speak English, and Lee was in
no rush to help her learn.(10)Rather than
deal honestly with some of the new people he met in Texas, Lee chose to
continue his untruthful ways. This is the point in Lee's life when he began
to tell a certain type of lie: the type which was absolutely needless and
unnecessary. After returning to the United States, Lee seemed to lie at
least as much out of habit as of necessity, to the point where it struck
people other than Marina that Lee appeared to simply enjoy lying for the
opportunity to conceal.(11)

In Dallas,
Oswald met a man named George Bouhe, who helped him get settled in the
new town, and may even have tided him over with occasional monetary supplements.(12)Asking Lee to keep in touch, Bouhe assumed that Lee would provide
him with occasional updates of his whereabouts and employment situation.
Instead, Lee would only call Bouhe from a pay phone every few days, mutter
"I'm doing fine" into the phone, and hang up. When the befuddled
Bouhe finally asked Oswald where he was staying, Oswald told him he was
at the Carlton Boarding House in the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. In truth,
Oswald had never been there at all.(13)Later,
Oswald would use Bouhe and others as references for job applications without
their knowledge, and would usually provide the potential employer with
inaccurate addresses for such acquaintances.(14)

Lee and Marina's infant daughter, June, became sick and had to be taken
to (of all places) Parkland Memorial Hospital, where President Kennedy
was taken after being fatally wounded. Lee felt he would be unable to pay
the bill, and consequently told an incredible series of lies to try to
avoid paying for June's treatment (which consisted only of brief examinations
for the baby's fever of 103 degrees). He lied about his address, said he
was not employed (he was, at an advertising photography firm called Jaggars-Chiles-Stovall,
making as much as $1.50 per hour for a forty-hour work week), and that
he did not receive unemployment compensation of any kind.(15)Finally, Lee received, and paid, a bill for only two dollars.(16)At this point, Lee's lies had now included his wife, those who tried
to befriend him, and hospital personnel who only wanted to help improve
the health of his only daughter. The web of deception was growing ever
larger.

Oswald purchased two firearms in the year 1963, both of which would
be implicated in the Kennedy Assassination and the subsequent murder of
Dallas Police Officer J.D. Tippit. In ordering the firearms, he lied about
two major pieces of information, one of which did not seem to present Oswald
with an advantage of any kind. When purchasing the rifle, he lied about
his name, citing it as "A. Hidell" on the money order when sending
away for the gun on March 12, 1963 to Klein's Sporting Goods in Chicago
for the total sum of $21.45.(17)Hidell,
which rhymes with the name of Oswald's political hero "Fidel,"
was the fictitious name of the only member of Oswald's Fair Play for Cuba
Committee.(18)Prior to this, when purchasing
the .38 special Smith and Wesson revolver cited as the murder weapon against
Officer Tippit, he claimed his age was 28, when in fact he was 23 at the
time. It was not necessary for Oswald to tell this lie, since at the age
of 23 he was easily old enough to purchase a gun, and revealing his actual
age to Klein's would not have been problematic in the least.(19)

Lee as Political Activist

Speaking of the aforementioned Fair Play for Cuba Committee, the information
provided to pedestrians walking the streets of New Orleans also contained
a number of less than truthful statements. First of all, the pamphlet,
distributed in early June 1963, contained the name "A.J. Hidell,"
Oswald's alternate identity (rhyming with "Fidel," as mentioned
earlier). Oswald would also have Marina sign the name "Hidell",
who was "President" of the New Orleans Chapter of the F.P.C.C.,
on Oswald's so-called membership card.(20)Secondly,
the pamphlet stated that "lectures" would be included in Committee
Activities, although he would undoubtedly have been the only person doing
any "lecturing."(21)Finally,
the pamphlet by its nature, mentioning prominently the "New Orleans
Charter Member Branch," clearly implied that the organization was
quite large, when in truth Oswald was its one and only member. Now, Oswald's
web of deception was growing to include people he did not even know.

Oswald was not reluctant to lie to the United States government, including
statements he made to Agent Louis Quigley of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
(FBI). While being held on the charge of disturbing the peace, Oswald asked
to speak to an FBI agent, who turned out to be Quigley. Oswald told Agent
Quigley about some very basic personal information which the Bureau knew
to be false.(22)For example, Oswald lied
about Marina's maiden name, claiming it was "Prossa" and claimed
to have been married to her in Fort Worth, TX. When these comments are
taken in combination with Oswald's reticence on the topic of the F.P.C.C.
and its specific details in talking with Quigley, the interview essentially
boiled down to Oswald requesting permission to talk to the FBI purely so
he could lie to them.

Lee's "Revolutionary Resume"

Later in the summer of 1963, Oswald spent a good deal of time preparing,
for the New York School for Marxist Study, a resume of his life and many
of the activities it had (or had not) included. Often referred to as the
"Revolutionary Resume" (for reasons I will discuss momentarily),
it spoke of time he spent as a "Radio Speaker and Lecturer" (he
was once soundly routed in a radio debate in New Orleans), his "Street
Agitation" (a reference to the time he handed out the F.P.C.C. documents
in New Orleans, for which he was arrested and soon released after a charge
of disturbing the peace was filed), an "Organizer" (meaning,
presumably, the one-man New Orleans Chapter of the F.P.C.C. itself), a
"Photographer" (meaning the time he spend working at Jaggars-Chiles-Stovall),
a "Marxist," "Defector," and "Resident of U.S.S.R."(23)
Later, Oswald took this resume to Mexico City, hoping to impress the Cuban
Embassy with the qualifications it represented. Oswald wanted to gain entry
to Cuba in order to fight for the man he often called "Uncle Fidel."(24)

On October 14, 1963, Oswald rented an eight-by-twelve foot room at 1026
North Beckley Street, in Dallas' Oak Cliff neighborhood, using the name
O.H. Lee. At this point, Oswald was lying to virtually anyone who asked
what his name was, including the landlady and manager at this particular
boarding house, Gladys Johnson.(25)This
is the house to which Oswald fled after the assassination, before the slaying
of Officer Tippit. Not long after visiting this, his last residence, Oswald
was lying yet again.

Lee in Custody

Oswald was questioned about his involvement in both cases between the
afternoon of November 22 and the morning of November 24. Although many
of the notes from the interrogation were destroyed, some of Oswald's statements
were made on the record. Among them were claims that he purchased the revolver
in Fort Worth, that he did not receive any packages addressed to "Hidell,"
at his P.O. Box, such as that which contained the rifle, and that he did
not in fact, own a rifle at all.(26)When
it was discovered that Oswald was not telling the truth with regard to
any of these claims, the lies finally caught up to Oswald--the police and
FBI refused to believe much of anything he said. Now, he had nowhere left
to turn, no place left to run, no one left to deceive. Lee Harvey Oswald's
years of lies had finally caught up to him. Everything he had gotten away
with had come full circle, and he was seemingly paying all at once for
a lifetime of deceit.

Had Oswald trapped himself because, when his penultimate scheme (to
get into Cuba) failed and his life was "spinning out of control"
(Gerald Posner's term) he resorted in desperation to the one final act
that would give him the place in history he believed he deserved? Or was
Oswald's love of spy games, aliases, and false fronts turned against him
by people vastly better at that sort of thing than he was? Regardless,
it is hard to avoid the feeling that Lee Harvey Oswald's web of deceit wound up ensnaring him.